Coming to a Close

Clearly I have been a poor blogger lately. Work and various freelance stuff has simply been taking all my time, even though I have shot some film here and there (and I've got half a dozen rolls to develop in my backlog right now).

Furthermore, I'm afraid my time here in Valdosta is coming to a close and thus this blog will be a bit superfluous. I don't plan to stop blogging, I might just have to move on to a more generically-named place or perhaps finally finish my actual non-business website and find a home for my blog there.

Regardless, as the school year officially closes I think I will do another overview post for the month of April, roughly.

First out of the gate are some images from the new location I mentioned in the last post. I went a couple of times more, once when the river was cresting and the area was dangerously flooded, and the other when it was back to proper height. I also found out the area was sold to a new owner so I may not be able to return unfortunately. Anyway, I shot 4x5 with either way 15cm or 21cm APO Lanthars when it was flooded:

   

I went back with my Linhof 70 and 38mm XL, 58mm XL, and 80mm Xenotar later and made it to the actual banks of the Withlacoochee River finally:

 

I still have a couple rolls of color to develop from here so that's all I have from that outing.

Last month I also took a trip to Jacksonville to buy something and went to Big Talbot State Park while there with my 2x3 Crown Graphics, with my 38mm XL, a 65mm Super Angulon I was trying, and 10.5cm APO Lanthar:

 

Now one more set from April - I went out and chased a big thunderstorm front one afternoon and shot some cool photos with my Nikon F2 and variety of lenses, including a new 15mm f/3.5 lens I was trying. Here are a few shots, on Rollei Digibase CN200:

 

 

 

Oh and I burned through some other film on my Leica III just for kicks and shot this with an old Elmar:

Okay that's enough photos for now. I'll be here for a while yet but later this summer I will likely have to close up shop for a month or more. Stay tuned for a new location.

Of Reflections and Symmetry

It seems like one of the most common things I shoot is any kind of water reflection or symmetrical relationship. I just enjoy seeing that and photographing it.

I thought I would post a number of images made in the last couple of weeks that have reflections or symmetry, or close enough.

First, this photo I actually shot back in October. I posted the same photo in b&w back in early October. But I just now developed the film (Velvia 100F). I like the longer streaks of water in the b&w image due to a longer exposure, but the subdued early-morning colors are quite nice here. Taken with my Voigtlander 21cm f/4.5 APO Lanthar, and cropped slightly to make it more even:

I took a similar water reflection picture a couple of days ago at Banks Lake. I was trying out an interesting lens that I bought for all of $25 - a Rodenstock 13.5cm f/4.5 Trinar lens. This is a 3-element lens likely supplied on a cheaper 9x12 folder from the early part of last century. Fairly uncommon to find by itself, it's a nice little lens and pretty unique. Here's two images of the same subject, shot on either Fuji 160S or Velvia 50. This is an interesting comparison of the two films. I won't say which is which - though I think it's obvious:

I also shot this one afterwards, also on Fuji 160S, as the sun was setting:

On all of the above, I used a darkslide to cover up half the lens during 2/3 of the exposure to have the equivalent of a 2-stop GND filter, as I do not have a proper adapter to use one on this lens, yet.

Moving on from water reflections, here are a few symmetrical-ish photos I took last week wandering on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi during Christmas, with my Pentax 67ii and 55mm lens:

And now for something totally different, two photos from my Leica M9. Meagan and I were again wondering at a pier in Mississippi on Christmas morning. I found the repeating pattern of these logs interesting:

And then this line of seagulls and the pier behind them lined up in a very graphical symmetry to me (cropped slightly to enhance that feeling):

The first image above was with a 25mm f/4 Voigtlander Skopar, the second with a 8.5cm f/2 Nikkor.

Okay, that's enough for today. I hope you enjoyed.

Supposedly Winter?

For the past couple of weeks, Valdosta has been unusually temperate, in the 70s and 80s. Where is Winter? Perhaps we will get a cold snap for Christmas.

I spent an enjoyable afternoon at Grand Bay the other day in the warmish weather. I shot some T-Max 100 and Portra 160 VC 4x5 film I've been meaning to finish up (in my Grafmatic holders), as well as finishing a roll of Delta 100 in my 6x12 back. Here's a few b&w shots from the day:

Here are the color shots:

You'll notice some of these are a bit different than my usual style. Some have pretty short depth of field. I was just experimenting. This day I was shooting with my 75mm f/4.5 Biogon, 150mm f/2.8 Xenotar, and 21cm f/4.5 APO Lanthar lenses - some of my favorite glass.

Okay a few more photos - they harvested the cotton just recently but about a week before this I shot just a few photos of the cotton fields. I was experimenting with a new lens I bought, a Cinephor projection petzval that's around 120mm and f/2.8. This creates quite a striking image. Here are the b&w and color images I took with it of some cotton:

Wondering what it would look like normally? Well I also was testing out an old Rolleicord camera this day so I shot a frame with its 7.5cm f/4.5 Triotar lens at about f/13 and the minimum focus distance:

I really liked how the Triotar performed, by the way. This camera is now on its way to get a CLA.